10 Adventure Game Remasters we Would Love to See in 2026

3 weeks ago 10

Daniel has been playing games for entirely too many years, with his Steam library currently numbering nearly 750 games and counting. When he's not working or watching anime, he's either playing or thinking about games, constantly on the lookout for fascinating new gameplay styles and stories to experience. Daniel has previously written lists for TheGamer, as well as guides for GamerJournalist, and he currently covers tech topics on SlashGear.

The year 2026 is upon us, and it’s got quite an act to follow in the gaming department. In spite of everything, 2025 was a pretty good year for the game industry, seeing the release of both major and indie titles and the return of classic games and IPs. Hopefully, 2026 will be able to keep the ball rolling on the former, but for the latter, it might be a good time to dip a bit more into the pool of prospective remasters, particularly for adventure games that can keep us engaged for a good while.

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As we get into the back half of the 2020s, we’re getting further away from the games of the early-to-mid 2000s, which means it’s the perfect time to whip some of those older games into shape. After all, the purpose of a remaster, at least in my humble opinion, is to either rescue games that are trapped on outdated hardware, or punch-up games that are technically still available, but not in the most playable of states.

10 Wario World

It’s on Switch Online, but we Can do More

Near the end of 2025, Nintendo added cult classic Wario World to its catalog of GameCube games available to Switch 2 Expansion Pass subscribers. This was some great news, as Wario World is still one of my old favorites from that era. That said, Wario’s been getting stiffed a bit lately, and frankly, he deserves a little bit more than an emulated port exclusive to fancy memberships. If ever there was a time for Wario World to get a fresh coat of paint, it’s now.

If you’ve never played it, Wario World is a 3D platforming adventure in which our favorite greedy jerk smashes and piledrives his way through a series of wacky worlds in an effort to reclaim his lost treasures. It’s an exceptionally weird, creative game, thanks in no small part to contributions by currently-dormant developer Treasure.

One of the most consistent criticisms of Wario World is its relatively short length, clocking around 6 hours on a normal run. A remaster could perhaps add some extra levels or content, not to mention restore the more elaborate final boss from the Japanese version that was axed from the western version for seemingly no reason.

9 American McGee’s Alice

The Next Best Thing After That Canceled Sequel

American McGee's Alice Alice and Chesshire Cat

In the early 2000s, American McGee was one of the big name auteur game developers, with his first solo work, American McGee’s Alice, showing the world exactly what he was going for. It was a dark and twisted take on Alice in Wonderland, which is already pretty messed up, and a pretty wild action-adventure game in its own right. American McGee retired from game development following the cancellation of the sequel to Alice: Madness Returns, but if we can’t get him to work on anything new, a remaster of the original Alice would be nice, at least.

American McGee’s Alice has been occasionally likened to a third-person Quake, with a combination of pitched battle arenas and puzzle-platforming, all while following Alice from a behind-the-back camera. It employs a larger variety of action gameplay than its sequels, with an arsenal of vicious toys and power-ups available for Alice to destroy the twisted Wonderland denizens with.

If you want to get technical about it, Alice kind of received a remaster already, as you could download a free copy of it with a purchase of Alice: Madness Returns when that game first launched. Two problems, though: first, that was really more of a port than a remaster, and second, you can’t buy Madness Returns any more anyway.

8 Infamous

The Definitive City-Wide Mayhem Game

The late 2000s were the definitive era of sandbox adventure games. It was all about having a big city to run around in, and an interesting way in which to do it. One of the games that took the most creative stab at it was 2009’s Infamous, one of the signature series of Ghost of Tsushima developer Sucker Punch Productions. You can’t buy Infamous anymore, only stream it through PS Plus, but a remaster would fix that problem.

Infamous stars Cole MacGrath, an ordinary dude who finds himself at the epicenter of an experimental weapon detonation. Rather than being atomized, he finds himself with superhuman abilities, particularly electrokinesis, and sets off across the city to solve the mystery. Infamous made extensive use of the binary moral choice framework that was big back then, with missions allowing you to pursue good and evil paths and unlock corresponding upgrades and abilities.

There hasn’t been a new Infamous game since Infamous First Light in 2014, and with Ghost of Yotei on the books, Sucker Punch probably has some time on its hands to rescue the original from the void. It’d be nice to have a multi-platform remaster, since the original was a PlayStation exclusive.

7 Prototype

The Other Definitive City-Wide Mayhem Game

Speaking of super-powered sandbox adventures, when you think of Infamous, you can’t help but also think of its unofficial rival, Prototype. Both games released around the same time, with Prototype releasing for both PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. Unlike Infamous, you can still buy and play Prototype, though like most 360 ports, it could most certainly do with a remaster spit-shine.

Prototype follows an amnesiac man named Alex Mercer, who wakes up on a morgue slab in possession of deadly mutagenic abilities, which just so happen to resemble those of the monsters ravaging Manhattan. To find out what happened to him and save the city, Alex is going to have to do a lot of shapeshifting, and eat a lot of people. In contrast to its rival, Prototype has no moral choice system. You can devour as many innocents as you want, and the game won’t penalize you for it. Beyond sending more soldiers after you, I mean.

Getting a Prototype remaster on the board would solve two problems: it would help to remedy the glitches that accompany trying to play the game on current-generation hardware, and it might pave the way for a remaster of Prototype 2 as well. Hopefully, if they do remaster 2, it doesn’t have any dumb live-service elements.

6 Bully

Worth Enduring Controversy

Rockstar’s 2006 classic Bully was largely slated as “Grand Theft Auto for teens.” Unfortunately, given the problems and concerns with video games and schoolchildren at that time, the game was subject to quite a bit of controversy, with overeager watch-dogs claiming it encouraged kids to hurt each other. By today’s standards, the bullying that goes on in this game is like watching cavemen slap each other, so it’d probably be a safe time for a remaster.

Bully stars troubled youth Jimmy Hopkins, who’s abandoned at a crummy boarding school by his mother and swiftly finds himself embroiled in a civil war between the school’s cliques. The game runs on a real-time clock; during the day, you attend classes and play mini-games, then after school, you get up to missions involving pranks, petty theft, and other appropriately small-scale acts of mayhem. The most violent thing in this game is kids using slingshots and potato launchers; no one uses any guns or anything.

Even putting the nontroversies aside, Bully could really use a technical overhaul. Its port to modern platforms, Scholarship Edition, was quite buggy even when it first released, and has gone largely without patches since. Come on, Rockstar, you gotta give us something to tide us over between Grand Theft Auto games.

5 Dead Rising 2

The High Point of the Series

Back in 2024, Capcom released Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster, a full graphical overhaul of the original game with some quality-of-life stuff added in. It was really more of a remake than a remaster, but who can tell the difference these days? More importantly, now that that game is out as a jumping off point, it’s time to give the remaster treatment to the game that really needs it: Dead Rising 2.

Dead Rising 2 is undoubtedly the high point of the entire Dead Rising series, giving us not only a larger map to run around in and all kinds of new furniture and knick-knacks to bash zombies over the head with, but also introducing the series’ signature combo weapon system. Wackier weapons, wackier bosses, and an overall more colorful setting really helped to put the fun in “fun-dead.”

Whatever Happened To Dead Rising?

Sure seems to be dead, not too sure on the rising.

The current ports of Dead Rising 2 and its spin-off, Off the Record, are notoriously buggy and poorly-optimized, making it difficult to experience this excellent game in an ideal state. A remaster could not only clean all of that up, but perhaps also merge the original game and Off the Record’s content into a single, coherent package, letting you play both Chuck and Frank’s campaigns. Goodness knows, I’d cough up for that convenience.

4 Metroid Prime 2: Echoes

We Got the First, Give us the Rest

The remaster of Metroid Prime that was released on the Nintendo Switch was very well received, with some calling it the definitive way to experience that classic game. Metroid Prime 4, on the other hand, was a bit on the divisive side, and perhaps not the follow-up to that revival some of us were hoping for. Perhaps Retro Studios just needs a little more reference material to get its groove back completely, and a great way to do that would be to remaster the remaining Metroid Prime games, starting with Metroid Prime 2.

Metroid Prime 2 built upon the bones of the first Prime game, taking the interconnected 3D world map and cutting it into two distinct halves, light and dark. This was back when dual-world gameplay was the hot ticket, and Prime 2 took an interesting approach to it by creating pockets of light within inhospitable dark zones, forcing you to move quickly and seek shelter from its corrosive effects. This game also served as the first full appearance of Dark Samus, if that does anything for you.

Like Prime before it, Prime 2 is currently not playable on any modern hardware, so a remaster would help to make it accessible again. It’d be great if Prime 3 would get the same treatment down the line as well, preferably without the mandatory motion controls.

3 Saints Row 2

Time to Start Mending Bridges

It’s no secret that the 2022 reboot of Saints Row was… less-than-stellar. It was pretty much just a complete and utter misreading of what people liked about the original games, which is probably why Volition went out of business afterward. Whoever owns the IP now, if they want to start mending bridges, a good place to start would be a remaster of Saints Row 2.

Saints Row 2 is a sandbox crime adventure in the same vein as Grand Theft Auto, but arguably much, much sillier. Your rival gangs included a group of wannabe samurai and a voodoo cult, one of your weapons was a shotgun concealed in a pimp cane, and you could play mini-games in which you sprayed liquid feces on the neighborhood or threw yourself in front of cars for insurance fraud. It was not a game that took itself very seriously, though ironically, that made its few very serious moments all the more impactful.

Saints Row 2 is still technically available for purchase on Steam, but the PC version hasn’t aged great. It’s very buggy and difficult to get running. A fresh remaster of this game would both solve that problem and, hopefully, get the franchise back in the industry’s good graces.

2 Sam & Max Hit the Road

The Classic Definition of “Adventure Game”

These days, when you say “adventure game,” you usually just mean “a game with an adventure in it.” In the olden days, though, “adventure games” specifically referred to point-and-click games like King’s Quest or Sam & Max. We’d be doing ourselves a disservice if we didn’t have at least one game of this classic definition on the board, and it’d probably be a good time to bring back Sam & Max Hit the Road.

Skunkape Games, a small studio composed of former Telltale Games employees, have spent the last few years remastering the three seasons of Telltale Sam & Max games with good results. Assuming they can get the go-ahead from Steve Purcell and, I guess, Lucasfilm, I would wholeheartedly welcome an attempt on their part to remaster the Freelance Police’s first adventure. It’s still a classic amongst point-and-click adventures for a reason: it’s chock-full of hilarious gags and wacky characters and background art, which would be cool to see touched-up and upscaled in a similar vein to the remaster of The Secret of Monkey Island.

Hit the Road is currently available for purchase on Steam, though it’s still powered by ScummVM, and it’s anyone’s guess how long that’ll hold up in the current PC framework. Might be good to get something fresh on the books, just in case.

1 Psychonauts

Long as I’m Asking for the Impossible…

Everyone has at least one game they will go to bat for that nobody else will. For me, that game is Psychonauts, though unfortunately, the ancient port available on current storefronts doesn’t run very well, so it’s a bit to recommend to people. A fresh remaster would most certainly aid my recommendation efforts, admittedly unlikely as it is to happen.

Psychonauts is a platforming adventure in which young psychic Razputin breaks into the covert training facility-slash-summer camp run by the titular organization, in the hopes of becoming a psychic secret agent. It’s one of the most delightfully creative games of the 2000s, thanks to some novel game mechanics, funny characters and dialogue, and clever psychological analogies.

Double Fine unfortunately doesn’t make games nearly as often as it used to, and considering the Herculean effort it took to make Psychonauts 2 happen, the odds of a Psychonauts remaster ever coming out, at least without some kind of outside assistance, are slim at best. But hey, to paraphrase a wise kid, as long as you’re dreaming, you might as well ask for a pony.